♪ on this edition for saturday, april 5th. a chinese ship hunting for malaysian flight 370 detects an underwater signal that could be coming from the missing plane's black box. the heavy turnout in afghanistan's presidential election, despite threats of violence from the taliban. in our signature segment, this irs insider says some tax preparers may be putting you at risk. >> we are harming taxpayers by not insisting that these people have some basic level of competence. >> and this woman goes looking for poets. where else? but on the new york city subway. next, on "pbs news hour weekend." >> "pbs news hour weekend" is made possible by lewis b. and

allow lease her shall field. the wall lack family. in memory of merriam and ira d. walla wallach. bernard and irene schwartz. the city foundation. rosalind p. walter. corporate funding is provided by mutual of america. designing customized, individual and group retirement products. that's why we're your retirement company. additional support is provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. from the tish wnet studios in lincoln, new york. >> good evening, thanks for joining us. there is a potentially significant development in the search for malaysian 777 that went missing four weeks ago today, with 239 people on board. britain's channel 4 news has our report. >> reporter: this is the chinese

patrol ship, the high shohio ohn 01. it picked up a pulse signal last night a frequency of 41.5 kilohertz, used by black boxes. its location was here, just north of where previous i couldn't say search efforts were concentrated and about 1800 kilometers from perth. >> if, and it's a big if, this is the ping from the black box recorder, it means the search area has gone to an area that was originally 85,000 square miles to an area that's going to be in the order of ten square miles. so we've gone from the impossible to the plausible. and it means that they will land using sight scan s.o.n.a.r. and rovs, remotely oppose rated vehicles with cameras and lights to look at the sea floor. >> reporter: chinese media on

board the ship filmed crew fishing out material from the sea around the new location. but again, no indication is related to the plane. it's important that the chinese get this right. there is very little life left in the battery of those black boxes. there is not much more disappointment to the families of those lost can take. millions of afghans cast their ballots to do to choose a successor to karzai. it will be the first ever democratic transfer of power. despite rain and threats of violence from the taliban, turnout in some parts of the country was so high, polling centers were kept open an extra hour. there was no major violence reported. official results are not expected for another week or two. if no candidate gets a majority, there will be a runoff between the top two finishers next month. we'll have more after the news summary. a federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit against the obama administration, brought by the families of three americans killed by u.s. drone strikes in yemen. one of those killed, anwar al al

awlaki, was targeted in september, 2011, after the u.s. concluded he was a terrorist leader. u.s. officials said the other two were killed by mistake. judge rosemary collier, who issued the ruling said, quoting now, in this delicate area of war-making, national security and foreign relations, the judiciary has an exceedingly limited role. for the first time in nearly 30 years, american and cuban boxers have competed against one another in cuba. the cubans won all five bouts last night in havana, four by decision and one by knockout. all part of an international competition involving 12 countries. two years ago, a team of american collegiate all-star baseball players competed in cuba. from south america, word that a volcano in ecuador has spew a column of hot ash and smoke six miles into the air, raising fears of an even bigger eruption to come. the volcano is one of eight active volcanos in that country, part of the so-called pacific ring of fire.

tyson foods is recalling more than 75,000 pounds of frozen chicken nugget products. this after the agriculture department said they may be contaminated with what it calls extraneous materials. some consumers have complained about suffering oral injuries after biting into small pieces of plastic discovered in the chicken nugget product. the suspect items were shipped to indiana and arkansas. for more about today's voting in afghanistan, we're joined from kabul by kevin, washington post bureau chief. you're out at the polls today. what were the scenes like? >> reporter: i think it depends where you were in afghanistan today. in kabul, the lines were very long. lots of men and women voting. in some places, actually ran out of ballots, there were so many people who wanted to vote. where i spent most of e day, about 70 miles south of kabul, there were very few voters.

quite a bit of sort of small-scale taliban violence. and people worried about the insurgents potentially punishing voters after casting their ballots. so i think it really varied across the country pretty wildly. >> what about the leading candidates. >> reporter: a former world bank official, johns hopkins professor, phd from columbia university, who ran in 2009. and i think at around 3% of the vote. did very, very poorly. but this time has managed to really galvanize a huge number of afghan voters. in part by choosing a controversial vice president, a warlord named dostin, very, very popular with certain ethnic groups, but has a sort of sketchy history. the other candidate who is doing very well is dr. abdullah abdullah, came in second to

karzai. and abdullah is the most prominent tajc candidate at this point. and it will do very well in the first round. the question is, in a country where the majority of the population are ethnic posh tunes, will abdullah and tajc be able to win the election. that seems unlikely. >> so you have one candidate favored by karzai, the one trailing in the polls, and a vice presidential candidate that's a woman. >> reporter: yeah, karzai has not publicly articulated any preference. there is widespread perception that he's favoring dr. sewell, his former foreign minister. but it's unclear exactly what that preference would mean, if it, in fact, is true. but rasual is a french educated physician, would be an historic thing in afghanistan. according to the polls, which, of course, aren't precise in afghanistan. he is in a distant third.

>> if one of these candidates comes into power, is there a difference in policy likely that will keep u.s. troops on the ground longer? >> you know, it's been a bit of a guessing game from -- at the u.s. embassy to figure out would there be a real difference in terms of the way these guys would govern. the way they would deal with the u.s. and the international community. at this point, they have all said almost exactly the same thing, which is that they understand that a good relationship with the u.s., with the west, is absolutely crucial to the future of afghanistan. of course, we heard hamid karzai say that a few years ago, and obviously he speaks very differently now. so the question is, once these guys are elected, will they sort of change their tune. i think it's very hard for an afghan leader, because you have to balance the sort of -- the importance of stressing afghan sovereignty, which karzai has done. with the recognition that this country will absolutely implode without foreign funding, especially without american funding. >> all right, washington bureau

chief in kabul. thanks very much. ♪ and now to our signature segment. the tax filing deadline is fast approaching, and tens of millions of americans are turning to professionals to prepare their returns. but as we discover, there are significant questions about how prepared many of these tax preparers actually are. "news hour" special correspondent, stacy tisdale, reports. >> reporter: it's tax time. and here in philadelphia, there's no shortage of store fronts offering fast refunds, instant cash and low prices. but for the taxpayer trying to decide where to go, it can be surprisingly hard to figure out how qualified your tax preparer is. anybody today can hang up a shingle and be a tax return preparer. nina olson is the national taxpayer advocate.

she heads an independent office, created by congress, to represent the voice of the taxpayer, inside the irs. >> if you get your haircut, if you go to a locksmith, there's all sorts of professional certifications. but not for return preparation. >> so there's no exam. >> no exam. >> no requirement you have to be educated on tax law? >> nope. you can just hang up your shingle or not, just do it on your kitchen table. and we are at our peril, harming taxpayers, by not insisting that these people have some basic level of competence. >> reporter: 46 states, including right here in pennsylvania, there's practically no regulation on unenrolled tax preparers. those are the hundreds of thousands of tax professionals who are not cpas, not attorneys, nor enrolled agents. all together, unenrolled tax preparers completed over 42 million tax returns in 2012. that's about 30% of all tax returns. as national taxpayer advocate,

olson has been pushing to regulate these unenrolled tax preparers for more than a decade. >> i started out as an unenrolled return preparer. in 1975, i hung up a shipping he will and i started preparing returns. i had no experience whatsoever. i bought a textbook on accounting, and i read the irs rules and the publications. today, with the advent of software, it's brought in all sorts of people. and they just plug in numbers with the return, and they don't know anything about the tax law. >> and for taxpayers, going to the wrong preparer can be a costly mistake. >> i went shopping around and found this place, just walk-in. >> reporter: sharon chance is a 42-year-old student in philadelphia. last year, she says a preparer at a store front tax service told her she could claim her god children for an estimated refund of $1100. >> she said all we need is their insurance cards, medical cards and did all that. >> reporter: but they're not your children. >> right. exactly. exactly.

and she said, well, does that help take care of them part of the year. and i said yes, i did. financially. but that was that. it wasn't like they were living with me at all. >> reporter: she says she didn't realize that to add dependents, they had to live with the taxpayer for more than six months. and before she got her refund, a letter arrived from the irs, asking for more information. puzzled, she returned to her tax preparer. >> she was like, oh, this happens to everybody, don't worry, your money will come through. we get this all of the time. >> reporter: and chance says the tax preparer wanted $100 more to fix the mistake. what happened? >> i had to take it into my own hands and contact the irs, do all the paperwork. i was very honest with them about the kids not living with them and i was not related and i could not prove that to them. so i did not get penalized for that. >> reporter: in the end, chance says she ended up getting a $400 refund, but she paid her tax return preparer $500. how did all of this make you feel? >> irritable. frustrated. i wanted to punch somebody, like

i really did. like, i was really angry. i can't even express. because nobody is out there helping you. nobody wants to rectify the situation. whether they're wrong or right. they don't -- tax places won't do it. it's just -- it just happens. they're trying it get you for more money. >> reporter: instant tax service, the preparer that did sharon chance's taxes last year, declined an on-camera interview. but a manager says if any clients had issues, they're welcome to come back to the office. irs taxpayer advocate olson says the lack of regulation leaves low-income taxpayers like chance particularly vulnerable. >> the low-income population is the population that is least equipped to prepare their own returns. and they also have some of the most complicated provisions in the code that affect them. >> if you worked and didn't make much money last year -- >> reporter: that means poor people who depend on one of the nation's biggest anti poverty programs. the earned income tax credit or eitc, can lose a big refund they

depend upon. and the federal government has lost billions, because of incorrectly filed tax returns. over the past decade, legislation to regulate tax return preparers has been introduced repeatedly in congress, with bipartisan support, but failed to pass. so in 2011, the irs started implementing regulations on its own, to try and remedy the situation. tax preparers would be required to take an initial certification exam, pay annual fees, and complete at least 15 hours of continuing education each year. the plan was supported by big tax prep chains like jackson hewitt and h & r block, both of which already have tax training programs. it was also supported by groups representing accountants, tax attorneys and enrolled agents, all of whom were exempted from the new rule. but in 2013, the regulatory plan hit a snag. >> you were so against this, you sued the irs. tell me about that.

>> yeah. a lot of people thought i was -- didn't think i had a chance at succeeding. >> reporter: john gambino, in hoboken, new jersey, who does taxes for many of his clients, would have been subject to the new test and education requirements. he was a plaintiff in a federal lawsuit brought by a libertarian public interest law firm. the suit challenged the irs' authority to impose what is called a tax preparer licensing scheme. and in january of 2013, a federal district court judge sided with gambino and halted the irs' program. ruling the agency lacked statutory authority. this past february, a federal appeals court agreed, leaving the new regulations dead. but despite the legal victory, gambino remains concerned about the potential for regulation, which he believes would be anti-competitive and increase costs for consumers. >> right now, they're free to choose. i have nothing against cpas or attorneys who practice tax prep. i think right now consumers are

free to go see these people if they prefer that. but they also -- lots and lots of them prefer to use preparers like myself who are not licensed, because they think they're getting good value for the services that we provide. >> but does it worry you there is no basic standard of competency to be a tax preparer? in 46 states, you can just hang up a shingle and say hey, i can do your taxes. >> it doesn't worry me, because i think consumers are smarter than politicians give them credit for. they know if they're getting a raw deal or not. i think people need to be free to engage in an honest living. and i think the regulations -- you're punishing people for a few bad apples before they have even done anything wrong. >> reporter: what's more, gambino says people should be skeptical that mandating a test will improve the quality of tax preparation. >> someone who is not ethical or doesn't know what they're doing, they would have more incentive to not sign a tax return and

kind of just operate in the shadows. and also, anyone can study and prepare for an exam. but it's not necessarily going to make them a good tax preparer either. >> reporter: the irs does support two large free volunteer tax prep programs. tax counseling for the elderly and the volunteer income tax assistance program or vita. >> good morning. >> reporter: mary arthur is the director of the campaign for working families, which runs 18 sites in philadelphia. she says free tax prep means more money returning to the community. >> over the past 12 years, we brought back over $200 million to the community. so, you know, this work is vital. and the dollars that come back to the families, i mean, in some cases that's their lifeline to getting through the year. >> reporter: even without a regulatory plan in place, the government does have ways to go after tax preparers who they allege commit fraud. department of justice has gotten permanent injunctions against more than 60 preparers over the

last year out of an estimated 900,000 or more. but irs taxpayer advocate nina olson says making sure all tax it preparers meet a minimum level of competency is a more efficient approach than going after fraudulent individual preparers. and the absence of federal oversight, olson does agree with john gambino that the exam and tax education should be voluntary. >> on tuesday, the senate finance committee will hold a hearing that will look into ways to protect taxpayers from what it describes as incompetent and unethical return preparers. taxpayer advocate nina olson, who you just met, will be among those testifying. learn about the free tax preparation service for low-income americans partially funded by the irs itself. visit newshour.pbs.org. if you have ever visited new york city, you know you can find just about anything, almost

anywhere. maybe that explains why one new yorker went looking for poets in the subway. "news hour" has the story that we offer during this national poetry month. >> reporter: madeline schwartzman spends a good portion of her morning, like many new yorkers do. getting to work on the subway. yet unlike many strap hangers, her mission isn't just finally getting to her destination in uptown manhattan. the journey itself is her goal. and her success all depends on the openness of strangers. >> can i ask you -- i'm doing a project called 365 subway poems by new yorkers. write about your life, anything. >> reporter: that's because on every single trip to and from work since last spring, madeline asks fellow commuters to write a poem in her notebook. >> i look for people that have this quality of openness. i can completely recognize who is sort of free to write a poem and almost who can write.

i can prove that. it's amazing. you can just tell. and it's not necessarily clothing and it's -- sometimes a look in the eye. it's the way they hold their body. every time i ride the subway, i ask a stranger to write a poem. >> to write a poem. >> would you do one? >> i'll try. >> okay. >> reporter: she then posts her favorite entries on her website, 365-day subway, poems by new yorkers. like this one, written to her. one stranger to another. >> this is phyllis at the fulton street station number 2 train. this is new york, spontaneity. a stranger asks usually for money. but today this stranger asks for something valuable and free. she asked for a part of me. i love new york. i'm somehow fascinated by it. i think we're all becoming more and more alienated. we can connect more through the internet, but we're more isolated. really, we're all independent and living apart, but the subway

is this giant connector. so i feel it's a very fertile site. >> reporter: schwartzman is actually not a poet herself. she teaches architecture and design at columbia university and barnard college. but she says she has always been fast naeted by how people connect in public spaces like trains. she says while commuting one day last spring, the idea to ask strangers to write poems hit her with a funk. she had the first participants write in her iphone. later that day, she bought her first notebook for the project. >> person-to-person, it's hand-to-pen. it's pen-to-paper. and i'm almost thinking, it's so powerful that i wonder if that is something really we're missing. like, why shouldn't we talk to strangers? why shouldn't the train be a party? why are there so many boundaries? >> reporter: now with more than 100 entries, she is on notebook number five. >> some days it's torture. like, if i'm having a bad day, i

think to myself at that time, why did i do this and how do i do this? this will never happen again. and then the next day or later on the way home, it's easy again. >> reporter: why do you think you're so successful? why do people decide to participate? >> i think people have things to say that they're not telling people. they want to share that they're in love. they want to share their pain. they want to share that they're having a bad day. but we don't really share the bad day with our friends. so they sort of share it with me. >> reporter: schwartzman plans to turn this project into a book some day. >> i'm starting to believe, it's kind of connection that my commodity in this project is connecting. and that you really feel something. it's almost kind of elation to connect to someone. ♪ this is "pbs news hour

weekend saturday." and now to viewers like you. most of the feedback we receive this week focused on our signature story about a lawsuit challenging california's teacher tenure laws, a lawsuit brought by several students who say those laws are preventing them from getting a good education. >> he wouldn't let students smoke marijuana. >> they were smoking marijuana in class? >> reporter: the kids' lawsuit is being funded by a multimillionaire. one viewer wrote this on line. this lawsuit is all about putting the jack boot of the billionaire on the throats of teachers. be honest. this is about silencing teachers and firing veteran educators, nothing more. but chris had this to say. what serious company do you know that would actually give their employees such benefits like tenure or seniority? do you think google, apple, et cetera, would be some of the greatest companies on earth if they allowed such employment practices? absolutely not.

we need to hold our public school system to the standards of the private sector. rachel andrews saw that the other way around. she wrote, i'm a school counselor and i would love to be held to the standards of the private sector. when i worked in the private sector, i started work at a specific time each day and stopped around a specific time each day. having been an employee of a public school system for seven years, i get to work early and leave very late. rarely even having time to eat lunch or use the rest room. stephanie downer told us on facebook that getting rid of tenure paves the way for teachers to be gotten rid of when the district wants a new teacher that starts at the bottom of the pay scale. ess mckay wrote, i have worked extensively in unionized and nonunionized schools. just because there is no union doesn't mean teachers aren't being taken care. remember, you can always tell us what you think. respond to the stories online or on our facebook page. or tweet us back at newshour. ♪

join us tomorrow on-air and online. despite all the headlines about the brutal drug war in mexico, foreign investments in parts of that country is surging. martin fletcher reports on mexico's increasingly promising economic future. >> invested half a billion dollars in this division. its 45 employees here have grown to 1800. >> that's it for this edition of "pbs news hour weekend." thanks for watching. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com

"pbs news hour weekend" is made possible by louis b. and louise hirschfeld koman. joyce b. hail. the wallach family, in memory of miriam wallach. the sharon and philip milstein family. bernard and irene schwartz. the city foundation. rosalind p. walter. corporate funding is provided by mutual of america, designing customized, individual and group retirement products. that's why we're your retirement company. additional support is provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

>> female narrator: in the middle of the 19th century, before automobiles, skyscrapers, interstate highways, and shopping malls, an ordinary citizen, frederick law olmsted, had a vision for america's cities. >> "we want a ground to which people may easily go after their day's work is done and where they may stroll for an hour, seeing, hearing, feeling nothing of the bustle and jar of the streets, where they shall, in effect, find the city put far away from them." >> narrator: throughout his career, olmsted designed over 500 nourishing green spaces in all corners of the country. >> olmsted, he's one of the towering figures in the history of american cities, the history of american landscape. >> he was the forefront of the anti-sprawl movement.